Complexity
by lilysnape3
Summary: His thoughts were interrupted by a deep voice.Avery."You were with her again weren't you?"  "Who?" Severus knew exactly who.  "The mudblood," he spat  "No I wasn't"  "Don't lie to me! I know you better than you think.You smell like her, filth."
1. A Rough Start

**Chapter 1: A Rough Start**

It was a rainy day. Lily Evans stepped inside Hogwarts castle dripping from head to toe, chatting animatedly with Alice Prewett. Upon arriving at the Gryffindor table, she stopped talking and gathered her auburn hair in both hands, attempting to dry it. After a long minute of wrestling with her long hair to completely rid it of the water, a sudden smile lit up her face. She took out her wand , said an incantation, and her hair became dry almost instantly. Despite the calm look in her light green eyes, excitement was bubbling inside of her from the moment she stepped foot into the castle. She could use magic. When she was at home, her parents, being muggles, got quite irritated when she took her wand out, especially her sister. Petunia had always been envious of Lily , especially when Lily had received the letter about attending the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It was then seen that Lily was a part of something special, exclusive, which Petunia was not a part of. Therefore, Petunia made it her goal in life to make Lilly as unhappy as possible.

It was her fifth year at Hogwarts and she felt particularly happy about being back. The only thing that was causing a small amount of annoyance was the fact that she had not been made a prefect. She was so expecting to be selected as prefect. Lily made no trouble in her fourth year, attempted doing better in her studies(although she wasn't sure what that had to do with becoming a prefect), and even brought an apple to all of her professors once a week, on her mother's advice ,of course, to get on a professor's good side. She never exactly got the reason why the food presented had to be an apple. Why not chocolate, or anything else for that matter? An apple? The apples had no effect whatsoever apparently because she had not been chosen as prefect. Maybe the apple technique only worked for muggles…

"He's staring at you again", she suddenly heard Alice say.

Lily snapped back into reality, "What?"Her friend jerked her head in the direction of a tall handsome boy across the table with tousled jet-black hair and hazel eyes. James Potter. Their eyes met for a brief moment and he gave a large dazzling smile, but then just as he started to wave to her, she turned her back on him. Her cheeks threatened to flush but she didn't allow them to.

Alice tossed her dark brown hair over her shoulder then turned to look at Lily eagerly, "So what do you think?"

"You want to know what I think about him? Oh I'll tell you what I think. I think he is an arrogant, snobby, show-off, idiotic little brat!"  
>Her friend laughed<p>

"Its true!" Lily continued, ignoring her friends giggles. "He thinks that just because he's now captain of the Quidditch team in addition to being seeker, it suddenly makes him a king or something. Just look at him! He's the most conceited person ever!" As though on cue, James started messing up his hair frantically with his hands. Did he think he looked cool or something with his hair messed up like that?

"Well you know what I think? I think he fancies you" Alice said staring at Lily with her eyes wide. "You know anybody would kill to be you , right?"

Lily merely grunted.

After the sorting had finished and the feast had ended, Lily and Alice got up from the table and were about to head towards their house when something caught Lily's eye. There was a boy on the end of the Slytherin table with shoulder length black hair , a hooked nose, and pale skin. He was scribbling furiously on a piece of parchment and as though sensing someone was staring, he looked up. His coal black eyes met with Lily's light green ones. Severus Snape. Severus and Lily were not exactly on good terms. They had been best friends when they were nine years old, excited about being able to go to Hogwarts together, but when they were put in the two rival houses, everything changed. He changed. When their third year began, he became meaner and started having a sort of evil aura about him. At the beginning of that year, they got into a huge fight where she had been trying to confront him about how much he had changed. From that time on, they hadn't spoken even once. They both pretended like neither one existed. Lily had only seen him once last year, as he was always in his own world, away from everyone else. He stood up, not breaking their eye contact, and Lily noticed how much he had grown. He had gotten a lot taller and more muscular it seemed (although she was not quite sure because of his robes) and his cheekbones were more prominent. If she didn't know any better she would even call him somewhat attractive. If she didn't know any better.

They stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity until he finally tore his eyes away from hers, hastily grabbed his things, and stormed out of the Great Hall.  
>"Are you okay?" Alice asked with a concerned tone.<p>

"What? Oh…yeah…I'm just…tired I guess." And with that, they were off to their House following all the other Gryffindors.

* * *

><p>After breakfast the next day, Lily took it upon herself to read ahead before her first Potions class. Finding herself a nice shady spot under a tree, she took out her textbook and began to read. Then all of the sudden she heard a yell.<p>

After the yell came much louder shouting and following that, a lot of laughter. Lily whipped her head around to the source of the commotion and saw a group boys crowded around under the tree next to hers; someone was hanging in the air above them, upside down by his ankle. After a closer look at the person in the air she let out a gasp. It was Severus. At that point she didn't know what she was doing or why, but she leapt to her feet and ran towards him. With another gasp of shock, she realized who was keeping Severus up in the air with his wand. It was James. And he was laughing like it was the funniest thing in the world with all his other stupid minions.

"Hey Snivellus!" James yelled to Severus "While you're just hanging like this let me make something clear…" But he had no chance to make anything clear because the next thing she knew she was up in his face shouting at him.

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR DOING?" She shouted looking up at James in disgust.

"Evans!" He grabbed her by her wrist(keeping his wand aimed at Severus with his other hand) and yanked her closer to him. Then he brought his lips close to her ear "How have you been beautiful?"

"Ugh!" She pulled herself away from him. James looked upset for a moment but recovered quickly. "Whats wrong?"

"WHATS WRONG?" she pointed up at Severus who was now furiously yelling curse words at James' friends, who were still laughing as if it was the funniest thing in the world. "LET HIM DOWN!"

"Hey, hey, calm down… although you do look really adorable when your face turns red like that" James added with a grin. Lily's jaw dropped at the audacity he had for flirting with her when she was like this, yet at the same time she flushed, only adding to the red color that her skin already was.

"Just…JUST DROP HIM NOW!" she shouted again, but when it seemed that James was stubborn not to listen to her, she added with much disgust in herself "For me…?" At that, James almost immediately put his wand down and stuffed it in the pocket of his robes.

Severus , who had previously been high in the air was now free-falling towards the ground. She half closed her eyes as he hit the ground with a loud _thud_. Lily ran towards Severus , grabbed one of his arms, and tried helping him up "Are you okay?"

"GET OFF ME!" he said trying to slap her hand away from his arm , but she did not let go. She was frozen in shock at the voice that had just come out of him. It was a deep voice filled with rage that was unrecognizable.  
>"I SAID GET OFF OF ME FILTHY MUDBLOOD!" Now that was hurtful. If any other person had called her that she wouldn't have cared as much, but he had never called her that before. Hearing him call her that hurt her too much to even bear. Just as her eyes were about to well up with tears, he pushed her away from him with much force. She let out a gasp, staggered backwards, and just as she was about to fall she felt a pair of strong arms around her waist steady .<p>

"WHAT DID YOU JUST CALL HER?" he said letting go of Lily and whipping his wand out of his pocket, pointing it at Severus. Severus smirked and reached in his own pocket but could not seem to find his wand.

"Looking for this?" Sirius Black, one of James' friends said. He was twirling Severus' wand between his three fingers.

"GIVE IT BACK!" Severus yelled running towards Sirius.

"We'll give it back if you apologize to the lady" Sirius said nodding towards Lily.

Severus looked at Sirius in horror "To her? No!"

"Then you won't be getting your wand back" said James with a sneer on his face. That sneer is what did it. He was just using the situation to his advantage. All James really wanted, was amusement. And Lily was not going to allow his bullying to go on any further.

"Just give it to him. It's okay he…he doesn't have to apologize to me." she said pleading with Sirius. Severus took advantage of the moment and snatched his wand, fleeing back towards the tree to collect his possessions. Just as he thought he was finished collecting his things, he started to leave until Lily's voice stopped him. "Wait."

There was a book of his still on the ground covered in some dirt. She picked it up, wiped as much dirt off of it as she could, and started to hand it to him. Their eyes met and his gaze softened for a brief moment before hardening again. He snatched the book from her and took off, his robes billowing behind him in the wind.


	2. It Only Gets Worse

**Chapter 2: It Only Gets Worse**

After Lily's eventful morning was over , she headed off to classes, but not before making sure to tell Alice every detail of what happened. Her friend's expression was filled with anger after hearing what Severus had called her but turned to pure glee after hearing what James had done.

"Oh Lily he's a terrible person!" Alice said, referring to Severus. "You were too nice to him! If I was you and he called me that I would've…" but Lily couldn't make out what she had said after that.

All of Lily's classes were going to be especially hard this year now that O.W.L.s were coming up. Herbology class with the Slytherins was the most unpleasant class of all today. They were supposed to wrestle the 2 foot long Spiked Ikert plants into their pots without touching any of their spikes. If a spike touched your skin it would excrete a poison, then the spike would dry out and fall off. Everyone had very thick gloves on. She had never done anything more difficult and tiresome in her life. Once she had successfully put her Spiked Ikert in its pot, she let out a sigh of relief.

Then suddenly, a single spike was flung on her forehead from the plant of the Slytherin who was working in front of her. She screamed. The spot where the spike had touched her was in so much pain! It felt as though a dagger had been plunged through her forehead. The world was spinning around her and her vision became hazy and spotted. The last thing she heard was the menacing laughter of all the Slytherins.

* * *

><p>"It does sort of look like South America" said James' voice<p>

"What are you talking ab-ohh I see…But don't you dare tell her that! She better not wake up with you here you know. I actually think that you should probably leave, she would freak if she woke up and saw you hovering over her," said Alice.

"Why? Why would she freak? How could she not like me?" He asked in desperation  
>She hesitated "No no, she doesn't ….she doesn't not like you…she just gets…well…gets really annoyed of you sometimes that's all."<p>

"All I've done is ask her out a couple of times"

"A COUPLE of times?"

"Oh you know…"

"Well if you really want to know…she thinks you're a bit conceited."

"A BIT?" Lily's eyes flew open and she allowed them to come into focus with the bright colors of the hospital wing before focusing her eyes on James. She just could not bear to feign that she was still asleep anymore.

"You've been listening, I see" said James with a flirtatious smile on his face.

"Yes I've been listening. And I don't think you're a BIT conceited. I think your VERY conceited."

"And why is that?" He said bringing his face so close to hers that she could feel his breath on her cheek. She was caught off guard, momentarily breathless, her heart pounding so hard she was sure he could hear it. Then finally…

"Hey you two! Kindly give the girl some space, she's just woken up you know!" she heard Madam Pomfrey say.

"Right…Well…Er…I'll just go" Alice said, her brown eyes darting around nervously until she found Lily's. She gave Lily a small smile before awkwardly waving at them and leaving.

"See you later, Evans." James backed away from her and turned to go , but not before giving her his signature dazzling smile that all those other girls fall for. Those other girls. Not her. Definitely not.

"Professor Dumbledore has asked me to pass on a message to you" said Madam Pomfrey. "He wants me to tell you that you will be replacing Frank Longbottom as a Gryffindor prefect for a certain amount of time. Frank won't be able to fulfill his duties at the time being because of an unfortunate family emergency. If your still not feeling well however, then of course we could have somebody else rep-"

"NO!" and at the alarmed look on Madam Pomfrey's face Lily gave her an apologetic look and spoke more calmly "No, that's fine, I'm…I'm feeling fine really."

"Are you quite sure?"

"Yes. Definitely. Couldn't be better!" She forced a smile for added effect.  
>The truth was she was not feeling too well at all. But she could not pass up an offer like this. After Madam Pomfrey had given her an ointment for where the spike had touched her to put on daily, she left the hospital wing an hour later, her spirits soaring high. Just the fact that Dumbledore had not forgotten her made her feel proud and more confident. She was to be a prefect!<br>Something wasn't right though. How come everybody was pointing and whispering when she entered the Great Hall? Why was the entire Slytherin table snickering at her as she passed? Whatever it was, she didn't care. Nothing could ruin her mood now.

"Hi Alice!" she said cheerfully, preparing herself for a nice, well deserved dinner.

"Oh, hi Lily…" She told Alice about her new prefect duties. Alice seemed a bit happy for her. Only a little bit though. What was wrong with everyone tonight?

Lily spoke her thoughts slowly "Alice…what's wrong with everyone?"

Alice spoke quickly and frantically "Oh Lil…I really didn't want to burst your bubble like this. I mean you came in all happy and I haven't seen you smile for such a long time! I was going to tell you earlier… I was! Its just…you were all exc-"

"Alice, come on…out with it!" Her friend picked up her bag and started digging in it looking for something.  
>If only Violet were here. Violet Bell was another best friend of hers at Hogwarts. Lily, Violet, and Alice were always the closest trio. Violet had informed them in the summer that she would be coming a couple days late to school, though she didn't tell them why. Violet is a very blunt and honest person. She's not afraid of telling the truth, even though the truth would sometimes result in an emotional blow-up on Lily's part. At least Lily didn't have to force the answer to what was wrong out of Violet like she had to with Alice. After much anticipation, Alice finally pulled out a mirror and handed it to Lily.<p>

"Why are you giving me a-OH MY GOSH!" Right where the spike had hit, in the center of her forehead, was an enormous blue spot that was swollen and shaped much like…like South America.  
>At hearing her voice, the Slytherin table began to laugh even harder, one even falling off his chair . Lily turned a violent red , got up , hastily grabbed her things, and stormed out of the Great Hall. She heard her friend calling behind her but she didn't listen or care. All she knew was that she had to get out of there as fast as she could.<p> 


	3. The Apology

**Chapter 3: The Apology**

She barely even slept that night; her forehead was in excruciating pain even after she put on the ointment. Her second day at Hogwarts wasn't any better than the first. Now that she had an enormous blue spot on her forehead shaped like South America, she was the laughing stock of all the Slytherins. People would point, gawk, and stare at it all day. She spent her night in the Gryffindor common room alone, she couldn't even bear going to dinner because of her humiliation.

Prefect Duties. What she was once excited about , she was now dreading. But she couldn't let Dumbledore down. She stood up, attached the prefect's badge to her robes(it had been sent to her by owl that morning), and headed out to patrol the corridors. Her patrolling was not too eventful since it was only the first week at school. Nobody had time to brew mischief…yet. Then something happened.

She heard the sound of quick footsteps coming closer. Her heart started pounding in her ears as she took her wand out.  
><em>"Lumos,"<em> her wand lit up and she looked around to see where the footsteps were coming from. She couldn't see anybody but she still heard the footsteps, they sounded even closer now and her heart started beating even faster.  
>Then all of the sudden she heard a deep voice behind her,<p>

"Lily."

She let out a scream but the person's strong hand clamped over her mouth. She pointed her wand that was still emitting light at the person's face to find, to her great surprise, that it was Severus. After she stopped screaming, his hand finally dropped from her mouth.

"Sev! What are you doing here?" Lily saw him flinch at her use of his old nickname. When he didn't say anything a realization struck her.  
>"Oh I know why you're here! You're here to gawk and make fun of the spot on my forehead aren't you? You heard all your stupid Slytherin friends talk about it and wanted to see it for yourself!"<p>

He sneered "Yeah, that's right. I heard it was shaped like South America."  
>Then he started laughing at himself as if he had just said the funniest thing in the world.<br>Lily, however, did not laugh. Her eyes started to well up and she felt a fat warm tear slide down her cheek. Then more tears. She had no idea why she was crying. Maybe she was just letting out all her frustration from her first two days at school, she was not sure. All she knew is that the tears wouldn't stop coming.

* * *

><p>Severus almost immediately stopped laughing when he realized she was crying.<br>"What are you doing? Stop that! Stop that right now!" he demanded. But that just made her cry harder. She began to turn away from him but he didn't let her. He didn't want her to leave like this.

Without even thinking, he grabbed her wrists and yanked her towards him , wrapping his arms around her and pulling her into an awkward bear hug. He did not know how long he hugged her, all he knew was that he had to make her stop crying.

* * *

><p>It did not take long for Lily to stop crying. Even after she stopped they stayed hugging for a bit longer. Then she remembered what he had called her yesterday, and pulled away slowly. After pulling back she looked him in the eyes. They had a familiar softness to them that she had missed for so long. Then almost instantly, his eyes turned cold and hard again. He pinned her arms back against the wall and stared at her a moment before speaking.<p>

"Listen! Don't you ever do that to me again, okay?" She did not answer him.  
>"DID YOU HEAR ME?"<p>

Lily still did not answer but was now struggling to get out of his strong grip on her arms. He finally released her and when she turned to storm away from him , he took hold of her wrist, not letting her go. Then he spoke again, calmer this time.

"Lily. The reason I came to you is not so that I could make fun of you. I came to…I came to apologize."

"Apologize?" She was stunned. Severus was not the kind to apologize for anything.

"Yes" He spoke slowly "I'm…I'm sorry for yesterday. For calling you a...mudblood."

Lily just stared at him in shock until she finally spoke, "That's…That's okay Sev." She pulled her wrist out of his grasp and turned to leave until he grabbed her again, pulling her around to face him.

"No. It's not okay" He said more firmly this time "I should not have said it and… I'm also sorry I pushed you and I—"

"I forgive you." At that, he slowly let go of her , watching her as she wiped off the left over tears from her face and fixed her disheveled hair with her hands.

"I guess… I'll see you around then," she said starting to leave again until his voice stopped her this time.

"I know of a way to get rid of that blue spot faster than that ointment Madam Pomfrey gave you."  
>Lily did not ask how he knew that Madam Pomfrey had given her an ointment, she simply said,<p>

"How?"

"I could make you an antidote that would work much faster against the Ikert poison in your forehead."

"How could you make an antidote for that?" she asked stupidly.

"Well I am quite skilled in Potions, as you know, and I could have one ready for you by tomorrow night…" He gave her a small convincing smile. She looked at him for a moment, hesitant.  
>His face fell, "You don't trust me, do you?"<p>

"It's not that I don't trust you Severus…it's just that…well…you haven't been exactly nice to me lately and I don't know what to expect from you anymore." She continued now more firmly "And I don't want to put my trust in you just to find out a day later that it was a mistake"

He looked deep into her eyes, "You can trust me, Lily."

"Fine then. Tomorrow night. But where will we meet up?" she asked him.

"The Gryffindor common room," he said swiftly turning to leave.

"Okay the Gryffindor comm—wait WHAT?" He was a Slytherin! How was he supposed to get inside the Gryffindor common room? But when she had turned back around to face him, he was gone.


	4. Violet Bell

After her strange encounter with Severus she couldn't help but lay in her bed awake thinking about the night's events. How was Severus going to get inside the Gryffindor common room? If he expected Lily to break the rules and tell him the password to get inside , then boy was he wrong. Had he not seen that she was now a prefect? She could not just break the rules like that!

She also thought about that hug. The hug had shocked her the most out of the entire night. Despite the cold, dark look he almost always had on his face, when they hugged he had been surprisingly warm and cuddle-worthy. Lily and Severus hadn't spoken a word to each other for 2 years, and even when they were friends, he had never hugged her or shown her any kind of affection. She told herself that she was just over thinking it. It was only a hug, after all. Right? She was confused, frustrated, and anxious. She let her emotions drown her , into a deep , yet troubled sleep.

She was dreaming that she was running away from a two headed monster in the forbidden forest, one of the heads had James' face, the other had Severus' face. The monster was about 15 feet tall and very hairy. It had 6 arms and its neck was about 4 feet of its height , connecting the two heads together. Both heads were repeatedly screeching Lily's name out while running after her. The monster was getting closer…closer…any second now and it would have her in one of its hairy hands. All the while it continually screeched Lily's name.

"LIIIIIILLLLLLLLYYYYYYYYYYY!" the James head screamed

"LIIIIIILLLLLLLLYYYYYYYYYYY!" the Severus head copied.  
>She was running as fast as she could, screaming as loud as she could, until she suddenly tripped and landed face flat onto the dirt.<p>

"LILY!" the monster finally caught her with its hand and brought her up to the level of the heads. Both the James and Severus heads looked at her menacingly as she squirmed and screamed, trying to escape.

"LILY!"

"LILY!"

"LILY EVANS!"  
>Her eyes flew open and she jerked into a sitting position, breathing heavily, her forehead throbbing with pain. When Lily had finally calmed herself, she touched her forehead gingerly; she just could not WAIT until this poison got out of her skin. It was still dark, she realized, before groaning. She couldn't possibly go back to sleep now and would have to wait for the morning to come.<p>

"LILY!" a voice said  
>She jumped up and screamed , whipping her head around she expected to find the two headed monster behind her. She did not , however, find a monster, but rather a person sitting on the edge of Lily's bed, her eyes wide with concern. The girl had short black hair into a bob cut and big pale blue eyes.<p>

"V-Violet?"

"L-Lily?" She imitated Lily's scared stammering. "Yeah it's me, I'm baaaaack!" Violet said in a singsong voice. "What has gotten into you, girl? Almost the minute I get here I hear these high pitch screams which I knew were yours of course bec—" She had no chance to finish because Lily had thrown herself on Violet, hugging her tightly.

"I'VE MISSED YOU! Where in the world have you been? You've got loads of explaining to do, you know!"

"I know, I know," said Violet pulling away from her with a secretive smile. Lily gasped. She knew that smile.

"Who is he? Where's he from? What's he look like? How-"

"Hey, hey, calm down! I'll tell you everything in the morning once Alice is with us. I don't want to have to repeat the story twice"

"Did I hear my name?" said a voice from behind them. They turned around to find Alice rubbing her eyes sleepily with her hair disheveled.

"Alice! There you are." Violet said happily. Alice just stared at her a second before speaking.

"Oh my… VIOLET!" Alice ran to Violet, giving her a tight hug.

"Okay….Alice… I can't…breathe!" Violet choked out. Alice quickly let go and stepped back to examine her friend, eyeing her suspiciously.

"Sooo…who is he?"

"Who is who?" Violet feigned confusion.

"Oh come on Vi! I'm not stupid, I KNOW there's a guy somehow involved in your lateness to school," Alice said wagging her eyebrows .

"I don't know what you're talking about," Violet said defiantly, then after a moment's hesitation she added, "and what makes you think there's a guy involved?"

"Because you're doing that smile thing," Alice said simply.

"What smile thing?" She looked at them in confusion. Alice and Lily laughed.

"It's when you try to hide your smile, but instead of hiding it, it just comes out all crooked." Lily said grinning "It's quite funny actually"  
>Violet narrowed her eyes at them.<p>

"How'd you get here anyways?" Alice asked Violet, settling herself on Lily's bed next to them.

"Apparated, of course." She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Lily looked at her skeptically, "you apparated? But you can't app-"

"Apparate in and out of Hogwarts, I know. Dumbledore lifted the enchantments for a whole minute, enough for us to get inside the school grounds."

"But you can't apparate yet," Lily reminded her

"Didn't you catch the 'us'? I was accompanied by officials from the Ministry, all I had to do was hold my dad's arm while HE was apparating, and well , here I am."  
>Realization had finally hit her. Her dad worked at the ministry and the reason for her lateness was probably Ministry related as well as boy related. Lily was now very curious as to why Violet was late to school and was about to open her mouth until Alice beat her.<p>

"So anyways, back on topic: are you telling us why you're late, or not?"

Violet yawned, "Maybe in the morning, It's a long story and I'm really tired now…"  
>Alice put her hand in the pocket of her nightie, and drew out her wand.<p>

_"Lumos" _Alice's wand lit up the night, and without a word, she pointed it at Lily's forehead.

"WHAT IN THE NAME OF MERLIN IS THAT?" Violet screamed, pointing at the blue spot on Lily's head with her eyes half closed, as if it was too horrifying to look at.  
>Just as Lily had opened her mouth to explain , Alice clamped her hand over it.<p>

"You tell us why you're late and she'll tell you what happened to her"  
>It was going to be a long night.<p>

* * *

><p>Lily, Alice, and Violet, had stayed up until the sun came out, telling each other about everything they had missed.<br>Violet was late to school because of a trip her father had to make to Bulgaria on behalf of the Ministry of Magic in London. After her quite uneventful and dull summer, she had insisted on going with her father. They were supposed to be done a week before school started but got delayed. She had apparently met a young and handsome Bulgarian named Andon, who worked at the Ministry of Magic there as an assistant to the Minister. Whenever she began to speak of him her eyes would light up and she would talk faster, as if trying to fit in all of his amazing glory into one sentence. Violet had said something about a date they had together, a kiss, and him inviting her to visit him over the next summer. At that point, Lily had been so tired she couldn't quite keep up with what Violet was saying anymore.

Breakfast. After the talk with her two friends, Lily decided she had no energy to drag her legs down to the Hall to eat. She was lying down on her bed, refusing to move. How her friends were still lively with energy was beyond her.

"Oh come on, don't be such a baby!" Violet said pulling Lily's right leg with such force so that she slid off the bed and landed on her face.  
>She laughed, "Oh! Did I do that?"<p>

Lily groaned. "Leave…me…aloooone."

Violet hoisted Lily up by her arms, "No , you're coming to breakfast with us whether you like it or not."

She protested "But I've only had one hour of sleep!"  
>They didn't listen though. There was no arguing with Violet. Next thing she knew she was being dragged with them against her will to the Great Hall for breakfast. Lily was now shoving mouthfuls of soup into her mouth as fast as she could so that she could go catch up on 30 minutes of sleep before her first class. All the while, however, she couldn't help but feel that she was being watched. She slowly looked up to find , to her embarrassment, Severus eyeing her with his eyebrow arched, looking at her curiously as she shoved soup into her mouth. Lily felt a blush creeping into her cheeks and she quickly dropped her spoon with a loud <em>clank<em>. Then after a moment she gave Severus a small smile, which to her surprise, he returned.

Alice glanced quickly from Lily to Severus and back again, exchanging a look of wonder with Violet. She cleared her throat loudly before speaking "Care to explain?"  
>Lily broke eye contact with Severus and looked at her friends hesitantly.<p>

"Spit it out. Now." Violet said firmly.  
>Lily purposely had left out the story of her encounter with Severus when her and her friends had talked that past night. She knew that they hated him as much as the Marauders (James and his minions) did and had a feeling they would object to her decision of trusting him.<p>

Lily reluctantly ended up telling her friends about his apology and his offer to make her an antidote for the Ikert poison in her forehead. She left out the part about the hug, of course.  
>Violet was livid upon hearing that Lily had agreed and trusted Severus in making her an antidote.<br>"What in Merlin are you thinking Lily? He's not to be trusted!"  
>His voice echoed in her head.<p>

_You can trust me, Lily._

He had looked so genuine and sincere when he had said it.

"Yeah Lily! Remember when you two ended your friendship? You were really upset for a while after that. Right when I think you're finally over it, he comes along expecting you to trust him again, just like that?" Alice gave Violet a hopeless look that said, "Help me out here!"

_You can trust me, Lily.__  
><em>

"He could be planning something really mean and cruel right under your nose…"

_You can trust me, Lily.__  
><em>

"I say you just go and confront him now before he leaves the Hall, and tell him that you won't be needing his services anymore…"

_You can trust me , Lily.__  
><em>

Violet stared at Lily in desperation "Lily? Are you even listening to a word we're saying?"

She snapped out of her wandering thoughts.  
>"Yepp. Mhmm. Don't trust him. Got it," Lily picked up her spoon again to finish the soup that was now cold.<p>

Her friend continued slowly "So you promise you'll go up to him and tell him you won't be needing his help anymore…right?"

"Yepp."

"Good! Don't worry Lil, just stick to what Madam Pomfrey gave you to put on it and that thing will be gone in no time." Violet said reassuringly.

Boy was she wrong.


End file.
